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Immigration time lapse: Congress fights clock

Immigration on hold?

It won’t be an easy task.

The Florida Republican will be walking into the lion’s den when he speaks during the Federation of American Immigration Reform’s annual immigration “Hold Their Feet to the Fire” radio row in D.C. The local radio talkers on the right are standing firm: The country needs more enforcement and border security, but absolutely no amnesty. They don’t like the Gang of Eight immigration reform bill — and are promising to defeat it.

“I’ve never seen anything good come from a ‘gang,’” nationally syndicated talk show host Phil Valentine told POLITICO on Wednesday, the first day of FAIR’s gathering.

“Rubio says it’s not amnesty because it doesn’t forgive anything, but that’s like saying if you rob a bank and you bring back a third of it, they’re gonna forgive you,” Valentine said at the Phoenix Park Hotel. “To me, anything short of E-Verify and cutting off the magnets doesn’t work. And that’s what we’ve been preaching, demagnetize America. There are two magnets that bring any illegal alien here: jobs and benefits from the government. So you cut those off. … They’ll deport themselves. They’ll go where the jobs are. And if the jobs aren’t here, they’ll go back home.”

While those attending the FAIR meeting were united, some leading conservative pundits such as Sean Hannity, Charles Krauthammer and Bill O’Reilly have softened their views on the issue since the November election, voicing their support for the GOP to embrace a more tolerant immigration policy.

After Mitt Romney lost the November election, several conservative pundits began talking about the importance of addressing immigration reform within the Republican Party: Krauthammer, the syndicated columnist and Fox News contributor, said that “Republicans can change their position, be a lot more open to actual amnesty with enforcement — amnesty, everything short of citizenship — and make a bold change in their policy,” while Hannity announced his views on immigration had “evolved” and he supported a “pathway to citizenship.” In January, O’Reilly added his voice to the growing chorus, telling Rubio he agreed with his “fair” immigration plan.

And there’s no doubt that Rubio has been working the conservative media hard. Take Wednesday, for example, where the Florida senator appeared on several of the biggest conservative radio shows — including The Laura Ingraham Show, The Andrea Tantaros Show and The Mike Huckabee Show — to tout the Gang of Eight’s legislation.

But unlike some of the nationally known conservative commentariat, local right-wing talkers gathered here this week aren’t softening their approach. As in 2007, when conservative talk show hosts helped mobilize opposition to immigration reform and blasted it as an amnesty program day in and day out, local talkers this year are working hard to knock down the new proposal by casting it in the same light.